The days around baseball’s all-star game tend to be some of the quietest sports days of the whole year. In Minnesota, both the Twins and the Saints have four days off, and it just so happened that the Lynx and Loons don’t play again until Wednesday evening, and so all has been calm since Sunday.

With the benefit of some quiet, it’s hard not to notice how negative everything feels right now. The Twins are immensely frustrating. The Loons are outside the playoff picture. The Lynx are the best of the major-league lot, and even their best-case scenario for this season feels like being somewhere in the middle of the pack.

With that in mind, I thought I’d better sit down and make a list of a few players who’ve given me some hope this year - pleasant surprises, if you will. It’s small, but I think this is important, if for no other reason than just to manage my own attitude for the rest of the summer.

Bongokuhle Hlongwane, Loons winger
He’s scored five goals in MLS play and two in the U.S. Open Cup, and his underlying numbers are outstanding. American Soccer Analysis’s Goals Added metric ranks him as the second-best player in MLS this year, and ninth in expected goals + expected assists. The Loons have not been famous for playing young players, but Bongi just turned 23 last month, and he’s improved significantly over his rookie season last year. Plus, he plays the game with absolute joy, and he’s had the best postgame quote of the year, regarding coach Adrian Heath: “At halftime he shouted at me, and you saw that in the second half my game was not the same as the first half.”

Diamond Miller, Lynx forward
The second overall pick is averaging 26 points per 48 minutes, tops in the WNBA among rookies. For a Lynx team that is trying to find ways to build around Napheesa Collier, having that secondary scoring potential is huge.

Royce Lewis, Twins third baseman
He can hit AND he can field, which makes him a rare specimen for the Twins this year, especially among their young players. His main deficiency is a complete lack of any sense of self-preservation, which probably means he’ll play 100 games in a season, tops. He’s out right now with an injured oblique muscle, but the play I’ll remember is this one, where he nearly broke his neck crashing into the first baseman. This, after missing most of last season after running into the center-field fence. Throttle it down, Royce! We’re all worried!

Matt Wallner, Saints outfielder
If the Twins ever do call up Wallner again, I don’t know what the online Twins community is going to do. Checking his stats every morning, and seeing that he went 2-for-4 with a double for the Saints, as the Twins got one run on three hits as a team, is one of the few joys we’ve all had this year. Anyway, Wallner’s batting .292 and slugging .528 at St. Paul this year.

Maya Hansen, Aurora forward
The Burnsville native had 12 goals this year for the Aurora, which went 12-0-0 in the regular season. Here’s a much better profile of her, but it’s very enjoyable to see Minnesota natives doing big things for Minnesota teams, even at lower levels.

TODAY’S SLATE

LYNX at Dallas, noon
LOONS at Houston, 7:30pm

ON DECK

TWINS at Oakland, Friday
SAINTS vs Durham, Friday